The instant application should be granted the priority dates of Dec. 4, 2007, the filing date of the corresponding German patent application 10 2007 058 304.6, as well as Nov. 6, 2008, the filing date of the International patent application PCT/DE2008/001829 filed Nov. 6, 2008.
The present invention relates to a method for limiting the movability of an intervertebral disk prosthesis with regard to pivoting movements, and also relates to an intervertebral disk prosthesis.
Intervertebral disk prostheses are known where the prosthesis components permit movement in a number of directions, so that a patient having one or more prostheses of this type as an intervertebral disk replacement, to a large extent can maintain his original freedom of movement.
Pursuant to WO 2004/019828 A1, EP 1 124 509 B1, and DE 42 08 116 C2, limitations of the rotation about the vertical axis by means of shaping measures are proposed in that the sliding surfaces for the lateral inclination for bending on the one hand, and for the flexion-extension inclination or bending on the other hand, receive different radii of curvature. However, this entails complicated configurations of the prosthesis components.
In order to be able to imitate the degree of freedom of movement of a natural intervertebral disk, a prosthesis intermediate component is proposed pursuant to DE 103 61 772 A1 that between a cover plate and a face plate can carry out translational and rotational movements relative to the plates. However, with this proposal, movements cannot be limited in an optimal manner.
It is an object of the present invention to develop a method and an intervertebral disk prosthesis with which the movability of the replacement intervertebral disk can, to the greatest extent possible, be optimally adapted to the requirements of a patient.